How appropriate I write this on the Feast of the Queenship of Mary, August 22.
The reading in the Magnificat this morning is as follows:
“Just as the Blessed Mother shared in her Son’s work of redemption, His life and Passion, she shares in His rule over the world. Yet she is “more Mother than Queen” (St. Therese of Lisieux), and her care as Queen is for the good of her subjects and in a special way for the faithful, her children. Wrote Pius XII, who established this feast in 1954: Never has that hope wavered which (the faithful) placed in the Mother of the Divine King, Jesus Christ; nor has that faith ever failed by which we are taught that Mary, the Virgin Mother of God, reigns with a mother’s solicitude over the entire world, just as she is crowned in heavenly blessedness with the glory of a Queen.”
No matter the venue, we are all witnessing confusion. Egoism, hatred, and pride lacerate the Church, the family, and the state. Regardless of the subject, there is often discord on issues when years ago, most people would generally be in agreement. There are many reasons in the culture for this, and over time, this confusion has led to division. For faithful Catholics, few areas over the last few decades have been as volatile as the multiplicity of apparitions, and Our Lady’s role in the world. Often the confusion is caused by a lack of discernment, and everyone with an internet connection at 1:00am with insomnia has a comment and point of view.
The most recent announcements (May 2024) from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) have created concerns with the announcement of new norms for the discernment of the supernatural and the miraculous, and apparitions are a part of that. Previously, under the older norms, there were just three areas where the Church would make a declaration, and now there are six. Most notably, the Church will not discern the supernaturality of alleged apparitions, and the local bishop must submit his findings to the Vatican for final approval.
Recently, Our Lady’s role of Co-redemptrix and Mediatrix were challenged in the Vatican’s disapproval of the apparitions of Amsterdam called, Our Lady of All Nations. Yet, these Marian truths are in total harmony with the teachings of the Church, and it is necessary to throw light on these established truths, as a tree is judged by its fruits. If the message is good, how can it be bad or even doubtful in the parts that constitute the proper titles the Church has acknowledged in the past?
Most of the disorientation of Our Lady’s God ordained role in the world is a lack of understanding that she is prophetess of our age. She has been appointed by the Most Holy Trinity to fulfill a task, and in no way is there any conflict with firmly established Catholic tradition or doctrine. Saint, popes, doctors of the Church, scholars, and faithful over millennia have understood her uniqueness.
Our Lady is the Daughter of the Father, the Mother of the Son, the Spouse of the Holy Spirit, the Queen of Heaven and earth, Queen of the apostles, Queen of all saints, Queen of the family, the Immaculate Conception, and Mother of the Church. When she speaks, she is clear, concise, and direct—and there is no ambiguity. Her words below are a soothing balm on a wounded world. What mother would not warn her children of impending peril? She continually points to her Son what she said to the servants at the wedding feast of Cana, with the maternal counsel of the ages, “Do whatever He tells you” (John 2:5) still applies. Nowhere, have I ever seen after a lifetime of study and observation, such clarity on her role in our times, than the Marian Movements of Priests, and the locutions of Father Stefano Gobbi (1930-2011). The public messages were given to the world from 1973 to 1998, and Father Gobbi’s cause for beatification and canonization was opened in the Church May 1, 2024. Below in clear language that will satisfy a layman, is the role Heaven has given her for our times in her own words.
203, The Work of Co-Redemption, Anniversary of the third apparition of Fatima, July 13, 1980
“Assent to my plan, beloved sons, and allow yourselves to be formed by your Mother. Thus, I am able, more and more, to associate you with my maternal work of co-redemption.
Jesus is the only Redeemer because He alone is the mediator between God and men. He has however willed to take into partnership in His redemptive work all those who have been redeemed by Him, so that the merciful work of His love may shine forth in a greater and more wonderful way.
Thus you, who have been redeemed, can cooperate with Him in his redemptive work. He in you, who are so intimately united with Him so as to form His very Mystical Body can gather in your day the fruit of what He accomplished once for all on Calvary.
I am for you the perfect model of your cooperation in the redemptive work accomplished by my Son. In fact, as Mother of Jesus, I have become intimately associated with Him in His work of redemption.
My presence beneath the Cross tells you how my Son has willed to unite His Mother completely to all His great sufferings, at the time of His passion and His death for you.
If the Cross was His scaffold, the pain of my Immaculate Heart was like the altar on which my Son offered to the Father the Sacrifice of the new and eternal Covenant.
As Mother of the Church, I was also intimately associated with Jesus in the accomplishment of His redemptive work, which is carried out in the course of history, by offering to all men the possibility of accepting that salvation which He obtained for you at the time of His bloody immolation. Thus, the more numerous they are who attain salvation, the more fully is the masterpiece of His divine love realized.
My motherly task is that of helping my children in every way to attain salvation; and today still, it is that of cooperating in a very special way in the redemption accomplished by my Son Jesus. My role as true Mother and Co-Redemptrix will become manifest to all.
I want to carry out this action today through you, my beloved sons. This is why I have wanted to withdraw myself into the desert of your life, where I have set up my safe refuge.
In this way I mold you as a Mother so that, through you, I may carry out the great work of co-redemption. And so, I call you to prayer, to the perfect offering of yourselves, to suffering, to self-immolation.
I lead you along the way of the Cross and gently I help you to climb Calvary in order to transform you all into sacrificial victims pleasing to the Father, for the salvation of the world.
This is the time of my silent action. In the desert of your life, I daily work the great prodigy of transforming you more and more, that Jesus Crucified may again live in each one of you.
When this work of mine is completed, the greatness of the loving plan which I am now carrying out will become apparent to the whole Church. My merciful work of co-redemption has now become more necessary and urgent than ever.
The task which the Most Holy Trinity has entrusted to Me will be acknowledged by all, I will be able to exercise my great power fully, so that the victory of my Son Jesus may shine forth everywhere, when He will restore, through his glorious reign of love.”
204, Mediatrix of Graces, Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, July 16, 1980
“Beloved children, I am the Mediatrix of Graces. Grace is the very life of God which is communicated to you. It springs from the bosom of the Father and is merited for you by the Word who, in my virginal womb, became man to share with you that same divine life, and for this He offered himself as a ransom for you, becoming thus the one and only mediator between God and all humanity.
From the bosom of the Father, grace, in order to reach you, must therefore pass through the divine Heart of the Son, who communicates it to you in his Spirit of Love. Just as a ray of light, which passes through a window, assumes its shape, color and design, so too divine grace, merited by Jesus, can come to you only through Him, and it is for this reason that it reproduces in you His own image, the very same image which shapes you ever more and more to His own person.
Divine life can reach you only in the form of Jesus, and the more this increases in you, the more you are assimilated to Him; in such a way that you can really grow as His little brothers.
By means of grace, the Father communicates Himself to you ever more and more, the Son assimilates you, the Holy Spirit transforms you, bringing about a relationship of life with the Most Holy Trinity, which becomes ever increasingly strong and active. Within souls who are in grace, it is the Most Holy Trinity Itself which takes up its dwelling place there.
This life of grace has also a relationship with your heavenly Mother.
As I am truly the Mother of Jesus and your Mother, my mediation is exercised between you and my Son Jesus. This is the natural consequence of my divine motherhood.
As the Mother of Jesus, I am the means chosen by God by which my Son can reach you. In my virginal womb this first act of mediation of mine is carried out.
As your Mother, I was the means chosen by Jesus that through me all of you may reach Him.
I am truly the Mediatrix of Grace between you and my Son Jesus. My task is that of distributing to my little children that grace which flows out from the bosom of the Father, is merited for you by the Son and is given to you by the Holy Spirit.
My task is that of distributing it to all my children, according to the particular needs of each one, which the Mother is very good at knowing.
I am ever carrying out this duty of mine. However, I can carry it out fully only in the case of those children who entrust themselves to me with perfect abandonment. I am above all able to carry it out in respect to you, my favorite sons who, by your consecration, have entrusted yourselves completely to me.
I am the way which leads you to Jesus. I am the safest and shortest way, the necessary way for each one of you. If you refuse to go along this way, you run the danger of being lost in the course of your journey.
Today many have wished to put me aside, considering me an obstacle in reaching Jesus, because they have not understood my function as Mediatrix between you and my Son.
And so, never before as in these present times, are so many of my children running the risk of not being able to reach Him. The Jesus whom they meet is often only the result of their human research, and corresponds to their aspirations and desires; He is a Jesus formed according to their measure; He is not Jesus, the Christ, the true Son of God and of your immaculate Mother.
Entrust yourselves to me with confidence, and you will remain faithful, because I will be able to carry out fully my work as Mediatrix of graces. I will take you each day along the way of my Son, in such a way that He may increase in you to His fullness.
This is my great work, which I am still carrying out in silence and in the desert. Under my powerful action as Mediatrix of Graces, you are ever more transformed into Christ, that you may become fit for the task which awaits you. Forward then, with courage, along the way traced out by your heavenly Mother…”
432, The Travail of the New Birth, Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, September 15, 1990
“Beloved children, today I am associating you in the great suffering of your Immaculate Mother. You are the children of my motherly predilection. You have been chosen by me to form part of my victorious cohort. You are an important part of my plan as Mediatrix and Co-redemptrix.
My Son Jesus wanted me beneath the Cross, to associate my immaculate suffering with all His divine suffering. He wanted to unite my human suffering to His and He associated me intimately in the mystery of his redemption. Thus, He called me to be a true Co-redemptrix.
The fruit of my co-redemption is my spiritual motherhood. Beneath the Cross, through the will of my Son Jesus, in the cradle of a very great suffering, I became your Mother, Mother of all the redeemed, Mother of the Church and of the entire human race. And I have carried out this maternal function by standing, as a true mother, at the side of all my children, during the earthly course of human history.
I have not left anyone alone or abandoned; no one has ever been rejected or sent away from me. I have always been close to everyone, as a loving and sorrowful Mother. I have carried in my Heart the sufferings of all. I have carried in my heart the sufferings of the whole Church. I have shared in the immense pain of the poor and the outcast, of the sinners and the despairing, of those far away and of the atheists, of the good and of the wicked, of the great and of the small, of the priests and of the faithful, of the suffering and of the sick, of the agonizing and of the dying. I have become the Mother of all sorrows.
Above all, it is my motherly task to share in the great sufferings of the Church and of all humanity, in these days of the purification and of the great tribulation. It is these sufferings which are preparing the new times, the rise of the new era.
This is therefore the travail of the new birth. And, as a Mother, I am called to the task of begetting today, in suffering, the new humanity, ready for the meeting with its Lord, who is returning to you in glory.
For this reason, my little son, I have wanted you here again in the United States of America, to begin a long wearying journey through many countries, to hold cenacles of my Movement and to lead all into the safe refuge of my Immaculate Heart. I want you thus to be associated in my motherly work of co-redemption and I am making you more and more a participant in my great sorrows.
Become therefore the sign of my motherly presence, and give to everyone the charism of my soothing balm. Give assistance to those who are far away, comfort to the sick, courage to the weak, support to the little ones, grace to the sinners, love to the priests., light to the faithful, hope to the discouraged and great confidence to all.
You will see the greatest marvels everywhere, because the times of my maternal co-redemption have arrived.”